


Vindicatio Confessionem Dolor

by kiddywonkus



Category: Inception (2010)
Genre: Gen, M/M, anti-babysitting
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-09-07
Updated: 2016-02-05
Packaged: 2017-12-25 22:12:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 12
Words: 20,187
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/958182
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kiddywonkus/pseuds/kiddywonkus
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Arthur and Eames will burn Cobol to the ground.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

By the time Arthur finds out, it’s too late. Cobb’s body is crumpled on the floor in impossible angles, blood sticking to his teeth... his shirt... his kitchen floor. Arthur doesn’t check to see if the man is alive because his mind is focused on the next target. He can’t hear his heavy breaths, or feel the cold steel of his gun in the palm of his hand. He doesn’t hear anything. Feel anything…

…until he hears Phillipa screaming, and then there is a stinging sensation above his right cheek. At his feet are the bodies of a man and a woman, their faces hideously marred by bullet wounds. Arthur lifts up his hand to feels around his eye, dimly recognizing that he can’t see out of it. He only remembers that he caught an elbow before he’s stooping down to pick up a kicking and screaming Phillipa.

He goes into James’ room. It’s empty. He is about to leave, fear clutching at painfully at his heart, when he hears a shuffling sound in the far corner. Arthur strides back in and reaches under the bed and grabs until he feels a little boy’s ankle. He pulls James out, and the boy only stops screaming when he realizes it’s Arthur.

There are sirens in the distance, and Arthur notices the security cameras. The implications of that weigh heavily on his mind as he starts a fire in the kitchen next to Dom Cobb’s body. As he drives away, he prays the house burns completely down.

 

* * *

 

There is no one but Arthur.

He knows this.

First, Mal left them. Then Cobb.

While Cobb flitted from country to country, trying to illegally buy his way back home, Arthur was in California every other month with words like “Your father misses you” and “He’ll be home soon” wrapped like presents between his lips.

But Cobb came back, and Arthur visited less because there was more than just Arthur.

When Miles died in his sleep, Arthur got suspicious. When his ex-wife died from a home robbery, Arthur ran. He barreled down the Los Angeles freeways at death-defying speeds at three in the morning, dialing Cobb frantically. Had he heard? Is he gone? Did he ignore the warning signs?

Arthur knows the answers to all those questions now, and he glances at Phillipa, who sleeping in a ball in the far back corner of the car, her arms protectively around James.

There is no one but Arthur.

 

* * *

 

Arthur only has a few moments to stop by his apartment to destroy what needs destroying, and grab what he can’t bear to lose. In the end, he takes a blanket, fifty-thousand dollars of cash stowed in an old Alf lunchbox, a few containers of leftovers, and a photograph that is pressed in the leaves of a cheesy scifi novel from the seventies entitled “Robot Virgins from the Outer Reaches”. He takes one last look at the place his favorite apartment, sets it on fire and leaves it for the cops to comb through its ashes while he drives a rental car purchased with a fake ID toward the Canadian border.

He itches to go to Mexico. Less extraditable. Officials easier to bribe. It’s closer, but he reminds himself that Cobol has a foothold there. More importantly, he needs time to think, and the border is easier to cross in Canada.

Somewhere just north of Bakersfield, Arthur pulls off the 5 and parks at a Walmart. He carefully angles his car in what looks like a blind spot in the parking security.

“Phil?” he calls softly, keeping his eyes on the review mirror. “I know you’re awake.”

He watches her bottom lip tense up. “Phillipa,” he perseveres. “This is important.”

“What?” Her voice comes out, cold, cautious, and nothing like a child’s.

“I need to go in. I need you stay in here.”

Phillipa doesn’t answer. Her eyes are narrow with fear and accusation.

Whatever she's trying to communicate, Arthur doesn’t have time for it. “There are people who want to find you, and kill you,” he informs her coldly, his eyes uncompromising as they stare at her. “ _Find_ me, and kill me, and I’m the only one that can protect you. I need you, and your brother to stay in the backseat under this blanket. You leave this car without me for any reason, and I promise they will find you again. They will kill you.”

“You’ll kill us too,” she whispers. She is holding herself stiffly, every muscle tensed.

Arthur frowns. “Why would I do that?”

“You killed those people.”

“They were going to kill you,” Arthur responds bluntly. “Phillipa, I need you to trust me, because I’m going to trust you. If you leave this car, I’ll have to make a decision. Leave without you and make sure James is safe, in which case I promise you they will kill you. Or, I go find you, which will put you, me, and your brother at risk.”

Arthur doesn’t know anything about little kids, and he hopes that Phillipa, now that she’s eight, can understand everything he says. He’s not sure though. At what age do kids understand concepts like life and death? Should they be expected to?

They exchange looks through the review mirror, and finally Phillipa pulls the blanket over her. “What don’t you do?” Arthur asks, grabbing his wallet from the cupholder.

“Leave the car,” Phillipa answers meekly.

“And the blanket stays over you,” reiterates Arthur.

“Uncle Arthur,” she asks, her voice muffled. “Are we going to die?”

“Not as long as you do as your told,” Arthur said grimly, and exits the car. “Make sure your brother does too.”

Inside, he walks the aisles, his body sagging with exhaustion and only being pushed forward with the last vestiges of adrenaline. He can sort of see out his right eye now, but it’s hopelessly blurry. He buys a pair of sunglasses, a box of benadryl, a package of toilet paper, hair bleach, red hair dye, a bag of razors, a pair of scissors, a set of screwdrivers, a burner phone, a box of crayons, coloring books, six different outfits for all three of them, and some nonperishable food. No one looks at him twice while he self checks out and pays with cash. After all, it is a Walmart.

In the backseat, he finds the blanket is shaking. It’s only when he opens the door that he understands why. The children, huddling beneath the afghan, are weeping.

Not knowing what to do, Arthur puts the keys in the ignition and drives north as fast as he can.


	2. Chapter 2

They are at a dingy motel off the 5, sitting in the parking lot and waiting.

Arthur watches a trucker leave his motel room before checkout, and waits until the semi reaches the horizon before he jimmies the lock open and ushers the kids into the musty smelling room. He fights the urge to open up the window, and resolves to breathe through his mouth, but he can taste the stale sweat of past guests in the room and he can’t decide if that’s better or worse than smelling it.

He takes Phillipa first. Let’s her go the bathroom, and then he flips down the toilet seat and takes out the package of hair dye and the scissors.

Phillipa cries while he cuts her hair, but stays silent when he dyes it red, even when the dye runs into her eyes. She looks likes she’s bleeding, and Arthur has a hard time letting go of the image. That next to Cobb could be his children, also lying pools of their own blood.

James squirms while Arthur tries to shave his head, and he nicks the boy a few times at the base of his neck. When he starts to cry, Arthur levels a look at him, and he stops, though he continues to sniffle.

Leaving the two to watch cartoons on the unmade trucker’s bed, Arthur goes into the bathroom and bleaches his own hair. The bleach has an overpoweringly rancid stench, and he tries to use the left over complimentary conditioner to mask the foul smell. Now he just smells cheap. He changes into a pair of sweatpants, and a Los Angeles Kings hoodie, and pulls out a red jumper for Phillipa to wear, and a green t-shirt with a dinosaur on it for James.

He only has a moment to panic before he’s shepherding the kids back into the car. In that moment, he let’s himself feel everything. The grief of losing a friend, the fear of Cobol’s assassins, and the cops figuring out his real identity. None of this, though, has anything on the panic he feels when he realizes he has to take care of Cobb’s kids. He stares at himself in the mirror and doesn’t recognize himself, and he doesn’t know if it’s the hair or something else that’s changed him.

 

* * *

 

The drive has given Arthur time to think about his options, none of which are good ones. He can’t think of a single contact that can’t be compromised by Cobol until Eames comes to mind, almost as if he were avoiding asking him for help. When he concedes to himself that Eames is the only one who can aid him, a plan finally begins to formulate. He finalizes the details just as he sees the first exit to Sacramento.

Hesitantly, he dials. The phone rings three times and the call goes to voicemail, which doesn’t surprise Arthur. It _is_ an unknown number. Eames would _never_ pick up an unknown number.

The robotic voice telling him which voicemail box he’s entered is followed by a low, southern “Chuck Wagner”, and Arthur waits for the beep.

“Eames. It’s Arthur,” he pauses. He had thought so far ahead that he had forgotten to figure out how to convince Eames. “Cobb’s dead,” he informs flatly, not knowing where else to start. “I’ve got the kids. Need three Canadian passports and a flight to…” Arthur pauses.“Goddamnit. Anywhere.”

He ends the call and throws the phone on the passenger seat just as he passes a cop car. It doesn’t follow him, but he keeps his eyes on the rear view mirror for a long time.

 

* * *

 

Arthur pulls over around midnight, knowing that he has to sleep sometime.  His body is shivering with exhaustion, and fear; a constant, gnawing fear that stalks his peripheral thoughts, waiting to attack. Review the events of the night though he does, he can’t figure anything out. He doesn’t know how he didn’t figure out what Cobol was doing before he found Cobb’s corpse. He doesn’t know if burning his apartment is enough to cover his tracks. He doesn’t know if he can actually trust Eames.

His stomach turns with nausea as he helps James and Phillipa go to the bathroom in the woods, hands them toilet paper as necessary, and then feeds them Fruity Pebbles and half a banana with Benadryl hidden in its flesh.

“Uncle Arthur?” James asks drowsily, and Arthur is surprised to hear the little voice. It’s the first time the boy has spoken since… well, since his father was shot three times right underneath his floorboards.

“Yeah, James?”

“Where are we going?”

In Arthur’s pocket, his phone vibrates. "Somewhere safe," he mumbles as he takes it out, and opens the text message.

1446 Pine Cone Lane  
Medford, OR

Arthur frowns. He knows it’s from Eames even though the number is blocked, but it troubles him. Why didn’t Eames call? And was there really that good of a forger that lived in Medford? More importantly, can he be trusted?

There are a million things Arthur wants to text back, but he decides against it. Eames had sent him the address for a reason, and if he can’t trust Eames, he is screwed anyway.

Nervously, he checks the perimeter, pulls out his gun and checks the rounds. Then he sets the alarm clock on his watch, puts the car seat back and locks the doors.

“Uncle Arthur?” a meek voice comes out. “Where’s dad?”

“You know the answer to that, Phillipa,” he murmurs, his eyes burning with fatigue.

“Is he… is he dead?”

“Yes.” Arthur listens to her weeping softly as he begins to drift off, his thoughts only briefly wondering if he should have said something else.


	3. Chapter 3

Arthur awakes that morning with a start. He doesn’t recognize himself in the rearview mirror. He does not look good with blonde hair, and his features look pale and washed out. He moves the car and then takes James and Phillipa deep into the woods to go the bathroom, feeds them another Benadryl and continues their journey north.

The address Eames gave Arthur leads him to a dingy house on a narrow asphalt road outside of a small city park.  He grabs a grey hoodie, and it pulls it over his head before he exits. The air smells vaguely of freshly cut grass, and the grey clouds start to mist, leaving Arthur’s newly bleached hair to stick and curl about his forehead. It isn't a pleasant feeling, but he does his best to ignore it 

He’s already thumbed off the button on his holster, and he keeps his attention rapt and his hands ready to grab at the gun. He feels exposed, and the desire to run gets stronger with every step he takes. He has thought about his situation _ad naseum_ and continues down the broken cement walk only because if he hadn’t thought of a solution by now, this must be the only way.

He knows that this may very well be where it all ends. That here, on a dead end street in Medford, Oregon, is where his future is. Either he made a good a decision, or a bad one, and he is going to find out which one it is shortly.

With more purpose than he is actually feeling, Arthur knocks on the door, his knuckles brushing off flakes of paint.

Inside, Arthur hears rustling, and the sounds of floorboards creaking.

The door opens without ceremony, and a man wearing an old plaid bathrobe is walking away from it. “Get in here, boy.”

Not knowing what else to do, Arthur complies, though not without raising his eyebrows.

The house is, not surprisingly, a mess. Arthur can see plates with old food crusted on it, and a coffee cup rimmed with dark brown circles. The carpet is the sort of brown that only happens after a lifetime of not being vacuumed, and there is a smell of mold and cigarette smoke in the air.

The man in the bathrobe opens a door, and the sound of creaking stairs reaches Arthur. Cautiously, keeping his hand close to his gun, he follows.

“Eames says you’re in trouble with Cobol,” the man speaks, walking over to a heavily scratched computer desk where Arthur can’t help but notice houses a rather large bottle of Johnny Walker. Arthur looks around the room. There are all sorts of equipment that he barely recognizes. Some of it looks like printers, some of it is computers of varying ages, and some of it he couldn’t even begin to guess at its purpose. “Hate Cobol. Used to work for them. Didn’t have a conscious for a while, so it didn’t bother me. Then I guess it got me, you know, what they were doing…”

Arthur assumes he’s talking about corporate espionage through dream sharing, but he doesn’t ask. It could be the way the brutally take out their competitors, and any environmental group that dares to stand up to them too. Maybe it's their scorched earth tactics when someone wrongs them, Cobb's family being the most recent reminder. Really, with Cobol, there are any number of reasons to hate them.

However briefly, he hates Cobb for getting them into this mess. He begged Cobb to listen to reason before they took the job to rob Saitou of his business plans. “We screw up, that’s it. It’s not worth the risk.” It seems just as logical now as it did then, and he blames the mess they are in now because he could never really stand up to Dom Cobb.

“Anyway. Eames vouches for you, and I want to fuck over Cobol every chance I get. Got nothing to worry about from me.” The man eyes Arthur’s gun meaningfully. “Stand up against that wall there.”

Arthur keeps his hand at the ready and looks at the white sheet strung across the wall, and raises an eyebrow. “Why?”

“Gotta take your picture, don’t I?”

Arthur nods, and lets him take out a digital camera to shoot him. “That’s quite a black eye you got there,” the man notes, frowning.

Arthur gingerly brings his hand up to his eye, only just now remembering that it was hurt. His vision had slowly returned, but it is still half swollen shut.

“It’s alright, I can fix it.”

Arthur watches as the deep purple mark around his right eye fades from sight on in the Photoshop window, but it still doesn’t look like him. Some cheap, white trash guido is staring at him in the computer screen. _How is that possible?_ he wonders. He’s a jew from Pennslyvania.

When the forger is done, he swivels on his torn up office chair and asks, “Are the other two for you? Or are they for others?”

“Two others,” Arthur responds, suddenly feeling uncomfortable bringing the children in, but feeling decidedly less comfortable leaving them on the car.

“Well, go get them.”

James and Phillipa are still sleeping in the car when Arthur opens the back door. It’s only now that he realizes he barely recognizes them. Phillipa’s pretty blonde hair is replaced with her choppily cut red hair, making her look like an extra on _Little Orphan Annie_ , and James resembles a little toy soldier with his buzzcut.

Arthur checks the childlock, like he does every time he opens the door, and picks up James, using his hip to balance the child while he shakes Phillipa awake. “Phil, wake up.”

Quickly, he places two baseball hats on their heads and frowns at the fact that they are for the Dodgers. He had meant to buy the Oakland A’s ones.

James is drowsily coming awake, but resting his head on Arthur’s shoulder while Phillipa gets out of the car. Arthur takes her hand with his free one, and leads them into the house, kicking the door he left ajar with his foot.

The man doesn’t say anything when Arthur places the two children in front of the white sheet, but his expression clearly says “Kids?”

Arthur tries to answer “It doesn’t matter” with facial expressions alone, and it seems to work. The man says nothing, and they wait in the moldy, dark basement for the final pages of their passports to printout.

Taking the passports from the man’s hand, Arthur explains, “I’ll have to pay you when I get out of the country. I assume Eames vouched for me on that front too.”

“He didn’t have to. I owe him a favor. Hold on a sec, though. Gotta print you off your plane tickets.”

Antsy to get out, Arthur keeps his eyes roving around the basement, his gaze constantly lingering on the basement windows, unfounded suspicion welling up in him.

He snatches the plane tickets from the man’s hand the instant they print, grunts “Thanks,” and then takes the children up the stairs with him, eager to get on the road. Maybe switch cars again.

“I have to potty,” whines James, and Arthur wonders how wrong it would have been to pick up diapers at the Walmart.

Arthur weighs his options, and decides the child probably deserves to use a toilet at least once on their journey. His unease, he assures himself, is just paranoia. He doesn't ask to use the man’s bathroom, but pushes the door open, and watches James pull down his pants. He flips over a trashcan, spilling out a few dirty kleenexes, and sets James on top of it so he can reach the bowl.  The bathroom is yellowed, and as dingy as the rest of the house. It doesn’t shock Arthur that a brown film is crawling from the far left corner of the iced glass; the movement on the other side does, however, surprise him. It was impossible to know what it was, aside from being a tall dark blur that seemed to move like a human.

James is trying to zip his pants back up when Arthur puts his hand over his mouth, and throws Phillipa a warning look. Her eyes grow wide, and she freezes. She’s standing in the narrow hallway next to the front door, and it’s opening slowly.

Arthur takes his one free hand, the other still holding James’ mouth closed and pulls out his gun. He knows that Cobol assassins work in pairs. He knows that if he shoots, the other one will be warned. He knows he has two kids he has to protect. He knows all these things, but he can’t come up with a plan.

He is a point man, though. His job is to come up with plans, and when that doesn’t work, backup plans. His job is make things work, even if it seems impossible.

Two children in an unknown house in Medford, Oregon, flanked by two gunmen. He tries not to calculate his odds if it was just him he had to think about. He tries not to. But he knows they were infinitely better than the odds with the kids in tow. Being a criminal, a survivor, did not make him the best guardian.

Motioning Phillipa to get down, Arthur hunches down and inches himself between Phillipa and the slowly opening door. The basement door is still open, and he catches sight of the forger, his body sprawled out on the floor, dark, inky pool bleeding out from his neck.

“Fuck,” Arthur curses, and in that instant he changes plans. He kicks the basement door shut and splinters explode above his head as he scrambles for the front door. The assassin downstairs definitely has a gun.

He doesn’t bother to aim when he shoots, but he knows how he would open a door if he were intent on killing someone. He knows how he would react if he heard gunshots. So he doesn’t aim, but instead shoots up, and figures the shot will at least buy time for him to think, at most it will kill the would-be assassin.

The shots ring, and it makes his ears blister. The assassin at the front door thuds to the ground, a bullet hole right where his neck meets his jaw. He's still gurgling, blood coming out his mouth and his neck, but Arthur ignores it. Arthur sees the hole in the wall where the Cobol man had aimed, obviously thinking that Arthur would be standing.

The ringing from shots reverberate with James and Phillipa’s screaming, and Arthur doesn’t have time to consider how lucky, or unlucky he is. His mind is a rush of statistical probabilities as he shifts to his right and jams his foot against the basement door, thanking god for shitty houses with shitty architectural design where basement doors opened up just shy of hitting an open front door. There is a thunk at the door.

His mind subconsciously tries to alter the reality of the room, and he curses when it doesn’t work. Arthur fucking hates reality.

Arthur considers his options, and throws up his hood. They had time to run out, and get to the car, but the forger’s computers would tell Cobol where they were. He needed to stay there an eliminate evidence if they wanted any chance at all. Another thunk, and the shots fire through the door again.

He reasons that the assassin recognizes that Arthur is a professional by now, and knows he has two kids. Any sane man would have made a run for the car but Arthur sees beyond that, though. He banks on the assassin assuming that is his next move. It is a shitty way to play chess, but he wrenches the basement door open anyway and drags Phillipa and James behind them, as they try to muffle their whimpers.

He know the risk he’s taking; knows that it doesn’t matter if he gets shot first; knows that the kids would die if he did. Still he puts himself in front, just in case his gambit doesn’t work. It would at least give the kids an extra split second to run.

"We screw up, that's it. It's not worth the risk." He hears the words over and over in his head like his mind is a scratched record. "That's it. That's it. We screw up, that's it. Risk. It's not worth the risk. We screw up, that's it."

The small basement room is empty, except for the broken window and the body of the dead forger. He grabs the bottle of Johnny Walker off the desk and pours it over everything he can. Then he grabs the lighter next to the man’s box of half-empty cigarettes and lights the place up just as he hears the assassin’s footsteps on the top stairs.

"We screw up, that's it," his mind repeats

Wasting no time, Arthur shoots his gun towards the stairwell, intending for coverage. "Not worth the risk." He grabs James and tosses him through the window, knowing full well there could be more than this man. He shoots again. And throws Phillipa up, and then crawls through himself, the broken glass catching through his sweatpants. It’s just as the man round the corner of the house that Arthur lets another shot loose, and falls the man.

He doesn’t have much time, but he takes a moment to the rummage through the killer's pockets, but he finds no identification. He looks up at Phillipa, who whispers, “Uncle Arthur. Who are you?”

In another world, or another time, he would have taken that introspectively; may have even told her the world wasn’t as good as she thought it was, that being human was about surviving, and sometimes that was at the cost of others, and sometimes it was so others could survive. Instead, he looks at the corpse at his feet and smells the burning house, remembering his own burnt apartment and the two dead assailants in Phillipa’s room and acknowledges that _this_ is who he is, and Phillipa is now only realizing it.

Someday, soon, if they survive, she’ll find that this was who her father was, too.

Arthur doesn't answer her, though. Instead, he grips her and James’ shoulders, and ushers them to the car. He throws them in, and speeds off just as he hears the sounds of distant sirens. He closes his eyes for a moment, and let’s the fear in; he lets his mind repeat a never-ending stream of “fucks”. Then, he opens his eyes and decides what to do next. New car.

He times in his head how fast it would be for the cops to have a description of his car and phone it in, so he pulls off on a mostly deserted road, grabs the GPS, the kids, and the duffel bag full of stuff. He feels the passports and tickets in the pocket of his hoodie, and wonders how the hell we is going to get out of Medford, let along get to Eugene. He has the passports, though. He burned the computers. Maybe it would be to go for the border and board a plane in Vancouver. Find another way to contact Eames there.

Eames.

His thoughts stop short there. Never once, he realizes, does he think this was Eames’ fault. Who else could it be? Eames betrayed him. That’s how the assassins know where he is. Using those tickets would be a trap.

Even as he considers that, though, he can’t bring himself to believe it. Eames doesn't do corporate. Says they aren’t worth the risk, and he made fun of Arthur when the Cobol job went south, every joke punctuated with an unvoiced “I told you so.”

Arthur wanted to rip out his tongue and his eyes then, because fuck Eames, that’s why.

Then Arthur sees the bus coming toward the bus stop on the corner.  He knows it’s luck, and doesn’t dare think of how would he have gotten out of the predicament if it hadn’t happened. Find another car? Wander around with his description being put out on APB? Is he an idiot? So he looks at the miraculous bus like it’s the lifeline it is.

He ditches his plan of stealing another car, shoulders the children’s poorly packed bags and ushers them to follow him.

He walks up to the bus stop across the wave of smokey exhaust, Phillipa and James’ hands reluctantly in his, and steps on to the bus and away from his car, the license plates of which tucked away in a random dumpster next to his discarded hoodie. It won’t buy him much extra time, but it will a little.

"We screw up," his mind says again. "That's it."


	4. Chapter 4

Arthur stays on the bus, snags an RTD pamphlet, and listens to the stops to determine what line he’s on. Though he personally thinks he’s a little too young to have children of eight and six, he realizes that he looks like an ordinary white trash dad with two kids and goes with it as best he can; tries to let it relax him, the way Eames would slip on a new face and feel safe.

He never had to move without a suit before, and he finds it hard not to still adopt that same posture; face still, eyes hard, legs carefully spread shoulder width apart, and back straight. If Eames were here, he’d laugh at Arthur’s attempts to look like someone who had children at sixteen. He was a military kid, and military kids were different, Eames said. No getting around it. Arthur supposes this is true. His family never did stick around one place long enough to witness other kid’s bad decisions, or for him to really make his own. Individuality created from interactions with others was replaced with isolation. There was only one way to be in a military family, and Arthur didn't understand anything else; not until he discovered dreams, in any case. He didn’t join the military like his dad wanted, but he still moved as if he were in uniform. At least, that what Eames said.

Arthur had looked into Eames once, and decided the man didn’t know what the fuck he was talking about. The man was old money, and public schooled. If anyone grew up in a uniform, it was him.

Arthur manages to figure out the transfers that get him to the Greyhound bus station, where he buys the next ticket to the Eugene Airport. It was only when the bus leaves that he finally lets himself sleep, if only fitfully, his arms protectively around a stiff Phillipa, and a silent James. 

The passports have his and his children's names listed as Darcy. All he sees is that they all share the same last name, and it scares the fuck out of him.

* * *

 

Arthur doesn’t even know where he’s going until they get to the airport. He wishes he had internet, or bought a better trak phone so he can see what the news is for the shoot-out. He knows that he’ll have to transfer somewhere, but thinks if he can just get a flight out of Eugene, to… he glances at this ticket, Portland, things might be okay. Once in Portland, they can go wherever Eames has them.

He looks again. Tokyo.

Makes sense.

The tickets are way too expensive, but the ticket counter seems largely unsuspicious of his two sullen children, his black eye, and his need to get to Portland immediately. They do check his baggage twice though, and find nothing but clothing, crayons, and drawing books. Arthur longs for his gun.

* * *

   
Aside from on moment of gnawing panic as they had their new passports checked, getting through the airport at Portland was more traumatic in Arthur’s mind than it actually was. Amber alerts flash in his mind as he uses some of his remaining cash to buy a touristy shirt that said "I <3 Portland" and throws the now absolutely rank hockey jersey away. He is carrying James who sleeping against his shoulder, while Phillipa trails next to him as he aimlessly wanders to their gate.

Tired, but unable to sleep, Arthur stares out the window at the sparkling ocean below him while James and Phillipa curl up against one another. Arthur picks at his shirt and realizes he smells disgusting, even with a clean shirt, and he longs for his hand luggage. Why hadn’t he thought of grabbing some basic hygiene products when he left his apartment, or at the very least his five hundred dollar cologne?

Hindsight is 20/20, he figures, and hygiene is more than likely the least of his worries.

His mind tries to make sense of the past three days, and it can do nothing but repeat the same fears over and over again as he tries to fall asleep, but he knows that they are flying west and the sun will be right there with them the whole time, and he never could sleep when the sun was out. Not without somacin, of course. He closes the porthole, and watches the in-flight movie uncomprehendingly.

Tokyo, he thinks for the second time that day.

Makes sense.


	5. Chapter 5

Arthur wants to collapse while they stand in line for immigration, the three passports held firmly in his hand. He tries not to fidget as he’s desperate to get off international territory and onto foreign soil, which has the added benefit of Saitou’s protection. Yes, he’s extraditable in Japan, but he still doesn’t think the US authorities have much to link him with Cobb’s death, but that doesn’t matter. Once he goes underground, they’ll never find him again. Cobol on the other hand, well… that is another matter, and Arthur is going to give it his full attention once he has an attention to devote.

He knows a smattering of Japanese, but all of it is escaping him as he stares at the custom’s agent uncomprehendingly. He doesn't really even understand the heavily accented, and sparing English the man uses. In the end, he translates a series of gestures and makes it through the gates, holding a very grumpy James, and a quiet Phillipa.

“I want to go home,” whines James, and it grates on Arthur’s ears. Arthur doesn’t know how to handle children without presents, so he grunts, “yeah, me too.”

James continues to frown, and kicks his legs into Arthur’s side and they dig in just beneath his ribs.

Arthur doesn’t know what he expects when he walks out on the concourse. He had to leave the majority of his money behind in the car in Medford, Oregon, not wanting to risk getting stopped in customs.  He hopes he doesn’t have to find a cab, and a hotel, but he knows that is a very real possibility and the thought nauseates him. There are names being held up on signs, and families excitedly waving to people behind him, and Arthur keeps moving forward because what else can he do?

The airport benches call out to him, and he longs for them.

One sign keeps pulling at his vision. “Darcy” it says, nicely typed out and laminated. It sits on the edge of his vision like a phantom memory of a smell that one recognizes but can’t place.

“Uncle Arthur?” Phillipa says, tapping his forearm to get his attention. “Why is that man is waving at us?”

Quizzically, he looks at the man holding a “Darcy” sign, and then remembers that it’s his name. At least, a name. Well, the name he gave Eames when they first met at the very least. He hadn’t been Darcy since he had to burn the identity when the military was on to him. Eames’ fault, that was. Well, really, Arthur’s fault too. Never try to a con a con man was the moral they both learned from that story, but that was neither here nor there at this point in time.

“Mr. Darcy?” the man asks, his accent distinctly French. Arthur narrows his eyes and tries to figure where he’s seen him before.  His lanky black hair, which is greased back behind his sunglasses, and goatee distract Arthur from studying the face.

“Do I know you?” Arthur asks cautiously, without any particular reason. He knows that he is probably going to follow anyway. Then he remembers his passport says Darcy, and things make a little bit more sense.

The man smirks. “But of course.” Then he grabs their bags, and motions them to follow.

Hating every moment of it, Arthur trails behind. He hates that he’s too tired to think of anything else. He hates that he’s putting his trust in things he doesn’t really quite understand. He hates that Cobb’s children have to be in the middle of it, constantly pulling his attention in two other directions.

He hates Cobb.

* * *

 

When the car pulls away, the French man loses his accent. Now the accent is British, and distinctly familiar.

“Did you start up smoking again, Darling?” the driver asks. It pains Arthur that it takes a few seconds to realize who the man really is.

“No, Eames. Why?”

“You reek of smoke.”

When Arthur doesn’t respond, Eames continues. “Probably all that burning down of houses you’ve done. Did you shower at all whilst on your arson spree?”

Arthur grimaces. “Arson?”

“Yep. That’s what the news stateside is saying anyway. A strange serial arsonist burns homes. No connections between the victims. Not yet, anyway.” Casually, Eames shifts gears.

Arthur rests his head back into the seat and sighs deeply. It isn’t until the car pulls up into an impossibly narrow garage that he realizes he had fell asleep at all. It takes him a little too long to register it, and the door he had been leaning against is jerked away from him. He tried to pretend like it didn’t startle him, but Eames is smirking.

“Right. Up we go.” Eames says, shouldering the few bags they had. The greasy black hair is gone, and Arthur see it under Eames left arm, wedged against his chest. Arthur swings his legs out of the other side of the car, and rubs his eyes.

Phillipa and James stay put in the backseat, eyes wide, and seatbelts still on.

“Uncle Arthur? Who is he?”

Arthur rather thought for a moment that Phillipa was asking something far deeper than she was before he stops himself from saying something along the lines of Eames being a conman but probably still a good person but he’s not sure yet. “Eames,” he answers finally. “Close friend of your dad’s.”

Then he gestures for them to follow, and they do, taking small, hesitant steps.

* * *

 

“Congratulations,” Cobb says. He holding a cake, and Arthur is having trouble trying to read it. There are letters there, but he can’t focus on them.

“For what?” asks Arthur, straightening his tie and then smoothing out his lapels.

“On being a father.”

Arthur narrows his eyes, his hands frozen at the tie knot. His mind tries to work past an invisible wall that says _stop. This is real. Whatever you see is real._

And it doesn’t even matter that Cobb is bleeding from his eye sockets, his ears, or that the blood is spilling out of his mouth, because it’s real to Arthur.

“You’ll be fantastic,” Cobb smiles gruesomely, and walks away. Behind him is a dark sanguine trail that  stays while the rest of the world shifts. Though Arthur doesn’t really know where he was to begin with, it’s clear where he is now. It’s his old apartment, blackened and burnt.

Arthur spends the rest of his dream alone amidst his destroyed home, smelling of smoke and ash, rolling a die over and over again on a half-burnt end table with Cobb’s blood trailing out the door like a sigil.

His dice never once comes up as one.


	6. Chapter 6

Arthur hates that he sleeps so long. He hates that he wakes up, and decides to go back to sleep. He hates his body, which suddenly feels weak. Fragile. Broken.

He lies in an unfamiliar room, staring at an unfamiliar ceiling trying to formulate a plan, any plan, but nothing comes. He supposes the first thing is to sate his growling stomach, but he’s not so sure he wants Eames to know he’s awake.

He’s not so sure he trusts Eames, yet every time that thought comes to him he finds himself brutally beating it back. It’s around the seventh time his mind tries to come up with a plan for he and the kids to sneak out of the apartment and start a new life somehow without money that he forces himself to get up and wander out of his door and face his new present.

“Arthur, your hair looks awful,” greets Eames upon seeing Arthur walk unsteadily on the tatami in the living room.

Arthur doesn’t have the energy to shrug, but he mumbles something that sounds like, “It was the best I could do.” He finds himself avoiding mirrors like he’s some sort of beast in a myth.

“Well, I’m glad I’ve not been to your salon. Did you really think changing your hair color was going to lose Cobol?” Eames asks, getting up and walking into the adjoining kitchen.

“For a few hours,” responds Arthur, unrepentant as he seats himself on the floor and drags his fingers through his dirty, exceedingly dry hair. He’d have thought Eames would have done something similarly drastic if only to make the situational controllable; more like a dream.

“Well, that’s why you’re the point man because you were right.” Eames says from the other room, the sound of glasses clinking, making it somewhat difficult to hear. Arthur’s able to manage figuring out what he says by filling in the blanks. “Hair color, however, doesn’t change the fact that either you used the one identity they knew to track, or you called the one identity of mine that they knew.”

Eames comes out with a tray carrying a bottle of what Arthur presumes is _sake_ , and two glasses.

“It’s morning, Eames,” he reproves.

“It’s actually five o’clock in the evening, Darling, but points for trying.” Eames pushes the bottle towards him.

“So, which do you think it is? Steve Donell or Chuck Wagner?”

“I’m not sure yet, but I’m positive one us has got a mole in their network. And now I’ve got to good ol’ Chuck cremated somehow.”

Arthur leans over and grabs a glass, the liquid spilling out onto the crook of his thumb. He raises it, in memory to Eames’ dead identity. “To Chuck Wagner and Steve Donell,” he says before he downs it like a shot of whiskey.

“Here, here.” Eames raises his glass too.

They are silent, then. It’s been three years since inception, and three and a half since the incident. The one right before Cobol happened. The one that sent Eames to Mumbasa with his smug tail between his smug legs. Was that what happened? Arthur doesn’t know, and he’s sure Eames doesn’t know.

Arthur likes to think Eames is over it. Likes to think that Eames is maybe a bit proud of him; likes to think anything that isn’t “Eames is still pissed”, but he wasn’t even sure Eames was mad, and Eames, unfortunately, is hard to read.

Not knowing what lays between them other than pages of ambiguous histories written in metaphor and heavy with symbolism, Arthur decides there is only one course of action.

“Thank you.”

Eames pauses, the _sake_ cup stopped halfway to his mouth, and he looks at Arthur in what seems like confusion. Arthur isn’t sure. It looks like he’s going to say something as he inhales, and subtly moves his bottom lips, but he pauses there too. Gently, he sets the cup of _sake_ down and just says, “You’re welcome.”

And Arthur doesn’t really know what to think anymore.

 

* * *

 

 

Only one other person, aside from Arthur and Eames, knows what happened between them, and that’s Cobb. Maybe Mal would have guessed if she were still alive, but it doesn’t matter anymore. The only two alive who know are the two who will never tell.

Eames leaves Arthur to shower, but Arthur can’t enjoy it. Cobb’s bloody smile still stalks him in the darkest recesses of his mind.

There is no one but Arthur.

And it’s that thought, the one that repeated with every dashed traffic line on the highway in California, with every passing cloud on the flight over the Pacific, that keeps coming back. It acts like a stumbling block, an obstacle he can’t get around, and he despises it.

Eames is still in the living room, but the bottle of sake is gone. Instead, there is an assortment of breads on the table, and James and Phillipa are looking at each one like they are poison.

“ _Anpan_ ,” Eames explains. “It's got red bean paste.”

“That’s gross.” Phillipa says, pushing the bread away.

Undeterred, Eames grabs it and tears into it. “You ever had red bean paste?”

“No.”

“Then how would you know?" Eames takes a big bite. "Yum. Delicious.”

“What’s that?” James asks shyly, pointing at a _melonpan_ that’s been made to look like a turtle with four bread legs, a small bread tail, and a bread head with two sesame seeds for eyes.

“Melonpan, or really, Kamelonpan.” Eames smiles, handing the bread over to James. “It’s just bread and sugar.”

James needs no further convincing. He takes the bread and bites the turtle’s head off while Phillipa stares at the breakfast Eames prepared for them.

“I don’t want any of this.” She turns around, her arms crossed, and faces a corner.

“Suit yourself.” Eames shrugs, and takes another bite of _anpan_.

Arthur walks away from the scene and goes to his room to get some clothes. He rummages in the duffel before he gives up and dumps it all on the floor. It only has the clothes he bought from Walmart and he can’t stand any of them.

When was the last time he traveled with a duffel? Was it when he was fifteen? For summer camp? Seems about right. All he has is a red shirt with a dragon on it, and the pair of shorts he’s not entirely sure is going to fit him. He didn’t really look at sizes, and he hasn’t worn shorts in a long time.

He slips them on and grimaces. They are too loose around the waist and his boxers show. He catches a glimpse in a mirror, and he looks like a teenager on his way to NASCAR. He already looks way too young, but now it’s worse. The only other person who understands what that feels like is Ariadne.

Ariadne.

Arthur's heart clenches painfully at the thought of her, images of her in her Parisian apartment crumpled up like Cobb with blood spilling out onto the black and white tile floor filling his mind.

He strides of the room, and fixes his gaze on Eames. “Is Ariadne safe?” He is almost afraid to ask. This whole time, he had been focussing on his situation that he never thought to worry about Ariadne.

“How much danger do you think she's in?”

“I think Cobb liked her, and she was Miles' student. And,” Arthur pauses, suddenly realizing the kids were there. “Come with me,” he commands gruffly and walks back into his room.

“Really, Arthur,” says Eames when Arthur slide the door shut. “I don’t think that anything you say can further traumatize them.”

“What the fuck would either of us know about that?” spits Arthur.

Eames just raises his eyebrows. “In any case, yes,” he drawls slowly, “I’ve got a contact already on it.”

“Already?”

“Look, Arthur, I am quite capable of doing simple maths. Your phone call was as easy as putting 2 and 2 together. Cobb and his family are dead, you are running away under the guise of some California gangbanger without a bandanna, and I figure Cobol is back. I know how Cobol works.”

“Fucking Cobb,” Arthur bites.

Eames leans back against the window frame. “You could have stopped him.”

Arthur shakes his head.  No one could stop Cobb. Sometimes he has trouble remembering why he stayed with the man after Mal died; why he traveled the world with a person who could not definitively prove he was innocent of killing his wife; why he did stupid job after stupid job because it might get Cobb back to the United States as if that would suddenly make Cobb not a murderer. Arthur never once considered kidnapping the kids and getting them to Dom in an un-extraditable country. The very thought horrified him. Maybe he never really did believe Cobb was innocent at all...

“Can we trust your contact?” Arthur asks, trying to get out of a discussion he hadn’t mean to start.

“Obviously not, but I’m here, and I can only do so many things at once when I’m fifteen hours away.”

Arthur takes a deep breath, leans his head back, and wipes his hands across his face. “I’m going to kill them.”

“Who, Cobol? It’s not a person, Arthur. It’s like taking on the Hydra.”

Arthur doesn’t respond. He just gives Eames a heavy look.

“Right, well, I figured as much. Got you an appointment with Saitou.”

Arthur nods. “Do you have a gun?”

“You’re joking, right? This is Japan, land of no bloody firearms.”

“Shut up, Eames, and just give me a gun.”

Eames smirks. “Right. Top shelf in that closet on the left, there, love.”


	7. Chapter 7

After all the running, it feels weird that he is taking the Tokyo subway to Ikeburo to meet Saitou at a fancy _omuraisu_ restaurant. The very idea is unsettling to Arthur. Still, he looks over his shoulder and tries to recognize faces. He also tries not to focus on how strange it is that Saitou wants to meet at an _omuraisu_ restaurant and he wonders if that is a warning sign. _Omuraisu_ was essentially ketchup, rice and egg, and seemed the very antithesis of anything Saitou would enjoy.

He feels sharper now, and he’s able to start piecing together a coherent map of the train car, even as it shifts with every stop. He pays attention to shoes, clothing, movement, and expressions and he catalogues them in the back of his mind.

The shoes were always his favorite part. When he was a teenager taking the train into New York City, he would stare at people’s shoes and make up stories about them. He would marry strangers, and give them elaborate back stories that would criss cross from the front to the back of the train. He didn't have as much imagination now as he used to, but he still firmly believed there was a lot you could tell from someone's shoes.

He had left Eames at home with the children, not really sure at what age kids could be left alone. Arthur shakes his head. It’s for the best. They are safe with Eames, and he can have a conversation with Saitou without wondering what Eames knows and what Eames is holding back.

The address of the restaurant he’s sent to is written in _romanji_ on the back of a business card he can't read, and it’s on the thirty-fifth floor of a building that seems to be half offices, half shopping mall. The restaurant itself is empty, with a sign in the front door that reads reserved in red _kanji_.

Arthur walks in anyway, and is greeted by a Japanese waiter wearing a long white apron, a perfectly pressed blouse, and black tie. His hair is stylishly parted to the side, and he smiles as he says “ _Irashaimase! Darushi-san desu ka_?”

Arthur nods, recognizing the Japanese pronunciation of Darcy, the name Eames seems keen to pin on him. He is going to have to ask why the man is so attached to it.

The waiter gestures towards a table in the center, and says, “ _Douzo_.”

Arthur’s Japanese isn’t very good, but he at least understands all of this. He sits at the table, and smiles while they pour him water, and serve him a hot towel. Gratefully, he takes it, and places it on his forehead while he stares at the menu.

Of all the places Saitou would want to meet in, this is truly the most bizarre.

In the background, he hears another “ _Irashaimase_!” and he removes the towel to see Saitou striding in while buttoning his suit coat.

The figure he cuts is just as sharp and astute as Arthur remembers from the inception job, but his eyes are different. Limbo, Arthur reminds himself. Cobb’s eyes also had the look of a man haunted by hundreds of years he never lived.

“Arthur,” Saitou greets him, taking a seat at the table and ignoring the waiter who pours him a glass of water.

“Saitou.” Arthur nods.

Saitou motions for the waiter to stay, and speaks to him. Arthur picks out a few words, but he doesn’t really know what was said.

Seeing his Arthur’s expression, Saitou explains, “I’m ordering to save time. I’ve also asked we are not to be disturbed until the meal is ready.”

Again, Arthur nods.

“So, Cobol has finally decided to come after you.”

“They wouldn’t have been if you didn’t know your carpet so well,” remarks Arthur.

Saitou raises his eyebrows and shrugs. “Yes, but you made better money with me anyway.”

Arthur wants to argue here. He wants to say that they risked limbo, and no amount of money was worth that. He is still angry, and even angrier now that Cobb went and got himself murdered. The man was a black hole, and he sucked everyone in with him. Arthur wonders that once he reaches the event horizon, where a man would seem to pause in one position for the rest of eternity, if his mouth would be open in a scream. Finally, Arthur just says, “True.” Until two days ago, he is the richest he had ever been in his life. Now all of his money is wrapped up in identities and investments he can't touch, and he feels like it's his first day in dreamshare, just hoping he can work enough to afford his own PASIV.

“So, what can I do for you?” asks Saitou.

“If Cobol is after me, it means that you don’t scare them anymore. Your grip on power is loosening.”

“I’m in the same position I was before inception. That power was an illusion,” he emphasizes the final word. “They have only just now realized it.”

Arthur takes a sip of water to gather his thoughts. “What information can you give me?”

“I can give you everything I know, but I don’t know how it would help. Fisher may be gone, but Cobol is still a fierce competitor. Fierce enough that they would hire you to invade my dreams.”

“Whatever you have, I’ll take,” Arthur pushes.

“And what will you do with the information, Mister.” Saitou pauses. “Mr. Darcy?”

“Have you read Machiavelli’s _The Prince_?” Arthur asks, placing his hands on his lap and leveling his eyes to look straight into Saitou’s.

Saitou nods, his lips quirking into a half smirk.

Arthur explains, “I’m going to rule them the same way they tried to rule me. I am going to rule with fear, and the only difference is that I’m afraid of a whole lot less than they are. They are going to be child’s play.”

“This child’s play nearly killed you. Twice. Or so I have heard. As long as you have Cobb’s children to worry about, you have a liability,” Saitou reminds him. His accent is still strong and Arthur has to struggle through his remaining jetlag to understand it.

Arthur smiles, and leans back in the chair. “Saitou, you know me. Of all the people in the world who can take Cobol down, who do you think could do it?”

Saitou cocks his head in agreement. “You.” He pauses as the waiters come up to the table, two plates with ketchup and rice covered in a sheet of egg. The ketchup on top is darker than regular ketchup, and it swirls along the outside of the egg sheet in intricate patterns. When Arthur cuts into, he is surprised to find an assortment of expensive vegetables and tender beef.

When the waiters finish, and leave them to their meal, Saitou continues. “And Eames.”

“Ariadne may be alive too.”

“If she is, good. If she is, she won’t help you. She has much more compassion than you or Mr. Eames.”

Arthur nods, and takes another bite. The meat seems melt in his mouth, and the ketchup has a smokey flavor to it. He is starting to revise his opinion on _omuraisu_.

“Kobe beef,” Saitou explains.

Makes sense, Arthur thinks.

 

* * *

 

Arthur arrives back at Eames’ apartment, where it is quiet. And empty. His heart clenches painfully in his chest as he races from room to room, unable to get the screams and the sounds of bullets out of his mind. He swears Cobb is bleeding out in Eames’ small kitchen, next to the stove with a single range.

He pulls out his phone just as the door opens. Arthur’s hand dives for his shoulder holster and he aims a gun at the intruder. The only thing keeping him from pulling the trigger is the sound of rattling keys.

Eames walks in holding a sleeping James, and what Arthur can already tell is a grumpy Phillipa. When she sees his gun in hand, she screams, and dives for a table.

“Put that away, Darling,” admonishes Eames, gently settling James down on a floor cushion. Arthur complies, and goes over to where Phillipa is when a fourth figure stands in the doorway.

“Sorry, the roller on my suitcase got stuck…” The woman sees Arthur, who is kneeling down at the table about to console a crying Phillipa. Arthur stops and looks up to see Ariadne, very much alive despite a paleness in her face and a darkness around the eyes that tells a story that is very similar to his own.

Eames motions her to come away, and Arthur returns his attention to Phillipa. Prudently, Eames also shuts the door.

“Get away from me!” screams Phillipa. James, on the cushion rouses to wakefulness and begins to cry.

“Everything’s fine,” Arthur tries to explain.

“No! Get away from me!” She starts to kick, and Arthur doesn’t know what to do.

“Darling,” Eames places a hand on the shoulder. “Best you go for a bit. I’ll take care of this.”

Reluctantly, he withdraws, each scream and sobbing breath setting his teeth on edge.

Eames kneels down, but before he begins to console Phillipa, he looks over his shoulder. “You better move your stuff to my room, and let Ariadne have yours.”

Ariadne looks tired, and like she wants to put her stuff down. She’s frowning, and her dirty hair sticks to the side of her face. She does not look happy.

Arthur motions for her to follow him to the room that had been his. He shows her the futon, and begins to move his stuff out of the room while Phillipa continues to yell in tandem with James. He hears snippets of Eames talking to Phillipa. “He doesn’t want to kill you, love. He wants to protect you.” It all sounds far too trite to Arthur, so he elects to ignore it.

The cry and the screaming die down as Arthur goes back to Ariadne’s room. “Those Cobb’s kids?” she asks, undoing her scarf and throwing it in the corner. Arthur nods.

“I…” she stops. “I have a lot of questions, but… I’m too tired.”

Arthur leans against he doorframe. “Sleep. We’ll talk when you wake up. Do you need anything else?”

“Privacy,” she responds. Arthur lets her have it.

 

* * *

 

It’s dark, and Arthur forces himself to stay awake to at least see the moon rise above the buildings before crashing. The kids had already begun to slumber, and Arthur places food out on the table for them and Ariadne to enjoy without waking him up in the morning.

Eames doesn’t look tired, but he joins Arthur. In silence, the two change into their sleep clothes, which is really just the sweats Arthur had been wearing in his escape from California. It’s warm enough that he elects to not use a shirt.

Eames strips down to his boxer briefs and rolls into his futon. Even in the dark, Arthur can tell he’s awake. It’s one of the few moments they’ve truly had privacy, so Arthur forces himself to stay awake.

“Eames.” A thought had been bothering  Arthur. Eames isn’t jet-lagged, but the apartment certainly isn’t his. It’s too clean, and not enough articles of clothing are lying around, which had always been the hallmark of anywhere Eames inhabited for more than week. “Why are you in Japan?”

“Seems Cobol decided killing me would get to you,” Eames replies a little too easily. “Like killing the kids would get to Cobb.”

Arthur is stunned by the admission. He doesn’t know what to say, other than, “That holds you in rather high esteem.”

“Or maybe you’re not as good a liar as you think you are.”

Arthur swallows his answer, and looks out the window. The moon is in the far right corner, and it is waxing. It’s the last thing Arthur sees before he wakes in the morning. 


	8. Chapter 8

Cobb is standing on edge of a balcony, one hand in his pocket, the other holding a glass of champagne as he stares off across the bay. The city lights glitter on the surface, and Arthur somehow recognizes it as Budapest.

The part of him that tells him that this is impossible, that Budapest doesn’t border a large bay, is too quiet for him to understand.

“How are the kids?” Cobb asks. He’s wearing a tuxedo, and looks a bit like what Arthur imagines the Great Gatsby would be like. In the water below, Arthur can see a blurry reflection of himself melting in and out of the dark eddies. His hair is dark again, and he thinks it's a dream. Instinctively, his hand goes for his pocket, and he searches out his dice among the cloth folds. It feels right, but he waits to check it.

“They’re pretty messed up,” Arthur answers honestly.

“They were always going to be.” Cobb sighs, and starts to walk down the planks of the balcony, except it’s not. They are on a stone bridge. Arthur can’t figure out why he had thought they were at a house at all as they clearly traverse a bridge that Arthur knows he remembers but doesn't know from where.

Hands clasped behind him, Arthur says,“Well, I don’t think it can get much worse than it is now.”

It does though. When Cobb turns around, Mal is in his place. She is wearing Cobb’s tuxedo, and from somewhere beneath the jacket she takes out a gun. Before he can move, she shoots him in the knee. He screams in agony as pain jolts through his body.  Then she smiles, her right side of her mouth quirking up, and she shoots him between the eyes.

* * *

 

Arthur comes back with a shopping bag full of CC Lemon, and convenience store _gyuudon_. He went on a food run after it seemed obvious that Eames was only capable of bringing back packages of sweet bread. As he walks down the hallway of the apartment, he notes a neighbor who is struggling to balance a brief case, a shopping bag, and his keys as he tries to open his door. Arthur bows his head slightly as he walks past, and the neighbor stares at him, his eyes a wide and nervous. The fearful look is nothing unusual in Japan, seeing as most foreigners don’t speak the language and most Japanese don’t speak English, so Arthur doesn’t read into it.

Out of habit, though, Arthur glances at the neighbor’s forearm and notices two small red dots at his wrist. Calmly, he takes out Eames’ keys, opens the door and strides into the apartment. Ariadne is sitting down, her legs underneath the _kotatsu_ , a short table in front of the television, and the kids are sitting against the wall sullenly as they are assaulted with colorful images. Arthur glances at the screen, and notes that it's the Power Rangers. James is asking Ariadne why the people are Asian and not white when she sees Arthur.

“Where’s Eames?” he asks casually, setting the food down on the table. The convenience store had warmed it up for him, and Ariadne wasted no time tearing into it.

“In his bedroom,” she answers, her mouth full.

“Come with me,” he commands. Ariadne takes the _gyuudon_ with her, a bit of beef hanging out of her mouth as she struggles to right herself.

Phillipa stares at him as he walks past, and he tries to smile at her as reassuringly as he can. Her face is blank, and Arthur has trouble losing her gaze until he’s in Eames’s room.

Shutting the door behind Ariadne, Arthur speaks. “We’ve been compromised.”

Ariadne stops eating, her chopsticks halfway to her mouth. Eames, who had been in the midst of folding clothing continues to do so as if he is not surprised. “What’s your basis for that?”

“Your neighbor. He’s got Somacin marks.  They were on the inside of his wrist.”

“I know where Somacin marks are, Arthur,” Eames growls, slamming down a half-folded undershirt. “I’ve really had a bloody ‘nough of this.”

“You don’t think it’s strange, though?” Ariadne asks, quick on the uptake as always. “Why invade the dreams of a neighbor? If they know enough that we might be here, don’t you think they would just watch the building?”

“It’s Saitou.” Eames says. “Cobol doesn’t want to poke Saitou in his own territory unless they’re absolutely sure. They’re getting braver, but not that brave.”

“Besides,” Arthur interjects, folding his arms. “I’m betting having someone watch the building is dangerous as we’re under Saitou’s protection. The neighbor, they can get him anywhere in the city, find out that there are foreigners here and what they look like, and send him home with no one the wiser.”

“So what do we do?” ask Ariadne.

Arthur bites his lip, and considers the options. This, he reminds himself, is his job. Coming up with options is what made him the big bucks, even when corporations were after his blood. “There are two things we can do.”

“Get the fuck out,” Eames suggests and Arthur nods.

“Or we wait.”

“And see what secrets our assassin is hiding?” Ariadne asks.

Arthur nods again.

Ariadne presses her back against the wall adjoining the living room, and slides down to the _tatami_ , the food still in her hands. She lets out a long sigh, and closes her eyes. 

 

* * *

 

 

“No, Arthur.” Ariadne is furious, but it only shows in her eyes. It’s that intense look she gave Arthur when she said Cobb is crazy and he’s a fool for following along. Even then, he thought, _Aren’t we both the fools?_

“The kids can’t be here,” Arthur argues back, his voice low and cold. He is attempting to sound reasonable, but he’s pretty sure that this is the tone of voice that usually pissed her off. “What if something goes wrong?”

“Something will go wrong if you send me to Saitou’s with the kids in tow. Who do you know who can build a better maze than me in this amount of time?”

The answer is no one. Arthur knows it. Eames knows it. Ariadne knows it.

Eames is leaning against the wall chewing on pod of _edamame_ , keeping his eyes from looking at either Arthur or Ariadne. Arthur knows he’s mulling her words over, and he’s fairly certain that Eames agrees with her.

“When they come, it will be with guns, and you’ve never fired one before. Not even in a dream,” Arthur continues.

“I do more jobs than with just you. How do you know? “

“As much as I enjoy this spat between you former lovers, allow me to break the mood,” Eames interrupts, setting a pod down. “Ariadne is right. Arthur is right. So, it seems to make sense to me that the two of you go under. But, you’ll still need someone to watch your six topside, which makes sense that should me. You probably don’t need a forger down there, and Arthur knows a bit about extraction. It would also be stupid to have the kids here, but we can’t send them away because it will alert Cobol that we’re on to them. Really, Arthur, you’re supposed to be a point man.”

“All you’ve done is present the scenario in a different set of impossible circumstances.”

“Right.” Eames’ eyes still won’t meet Arthur’s. Instead, they are scanning the room. “Perhaps it’s time you face the fact that those children are going to be danger. That they always were, and they may always be. We put them under, and hide them. Then we do what we do best.”

Arthur swallows, and looks at Ariadne. She never loses eye contact when she nods.

 

* * *

 

“How did you get the shiner?” Ariadne asks while she helps place James into a piece of luggage lined with Arthur and Eames’ sweaters. He’s still small enough to fit in Eames’ oversize suitcase. Phillipa is already in a corner compartment of the closet wrapped up in a blue and white _yukata_ Eames had found.

Arthur gives her a quizzical look, and then he remembers that the dull pounding that ached across his right eye isn’t normal; that it had only started a few days ago. “Caught an elbow,” he mutters.

“Looks pretty nasty.”

“Had other things on my mind.”

Ariadne goes silent, and she stops zipping up the case just short of closing it. Arthur presumes it's to let air in, but there is something else wrong in her movement. Her eyes are distant, and her lips move like they are holding words back. “You know, Eames sent his man. Monteil.”

Arthur nods. He knows Monteil. His real name is Theodore Thibodeau, and he is a chemist. He also owes Eames a lot of favors seeing Eames saved his life after two of their team members had betrayed them. Arthur does not trust Monteil unless Eames is involved. Between the two, they have a strange honor amongst thieves. That isn’t to say that Monteil never had a problem screwing over Eames’ friends, but if it Eames asked him not to, or if it would hurt Eames in anyway, Monteil wouldn’t do it. Arthur could at least trust that.“I know Monteil.”

“He… he showed up to my apartment with a gun, and told me to grab everything I could. He said that Cobol was after me.” Ariadne sets her hands down on the case, her head bowed. “There was a knock on the door, and he… he shot whoever it was in the face. Then he told me to pack and get ready to leave.

“I’ve never seen a man die in real life before. In dreams, sure. But… jesus, Arthur. What sort of mess did you get me into?”

“The same mess you said yes to with inception,” replies Arthur.


	9. Chapter 9

Eames is chewing on a toothpick, his eyes only occasionally ever looking at the television screen that is softly playing music from an _enka_ competition. The singer is wearing a pretty white _kimono_ patterned with golden flowers, tied up in a purple _obi_.

“[ _Wajima, asaichi_ -](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dwK0CECEM4g)“ she sings, the minor melody drifting softly into the corners of the room. Arthur checks his gun, and then paces a little bit while Ariadne keeps her eyes glued on the door.

“What if it doesn't happen tonight?” she asks. “It’s not like we can to drug the kids and keep them in suitcases indefinitely.”

Arthur prudently decides not to tell her how much benadryl he had snuck the children on his flight from California.“They’ll come. The longer we’re here, the bigger the risk,” Arthur informs her, wondering why she hadn’t thought to ask it earlier.

Ariande nods, and continues to stare at the door. It's doubt, he thinks. Ariadne is losing faith in the plan with every passing minute.

“They are probably waiting for us to go to bed, Darling,” Eames says.

Arthur stops mid-step. He knows Eames is right. “We go to bed, and Araidne will be alone.”

“It’s not like they know our sleeping arrangements, and it’s not as if you and Ariadne have done the horizontal tango before. They won’t be surprised to find you in the same room.” Eames’ expression is hard to read, but Arthur thinks there is some wistfulness in what he says. “Go to bed with her. I’ll be able to handle anyone who comes in.”

“I want to be offended that no one thinks I can handle it,” Ariadne grumbles, “but you’re right.”

“I told you topside training would helpful,” Arthur says.

“You were never-ending in your advice, Arthur,” Ariadne agrees with a bite in her voice.

“Let’s just go to bed,” interjects Eames, turning off the television, “and see what happens.”

Arthur’s clothes are still in Eames’ room, so he follows Eames to retrieve them.

“What are you doing?” asks Eames, his voice low and a smirk on his face.

“Getting some clothes. Something I can move around easily in.”

“Ah,” Eames chuckles to himself, “I thought you were suffering from short term memory loss.”

Arthur snorts softly, and picks up his sweats and hoodie. “When this is over, we’re getting a good tailor, and I’m getting new clothes.”

“Mm,” says Eames, laying out his futon as if he really were going to sleep. Arthur watches the crease in the back of his shirt ghost across the gun kept in the small of his back. For a moment, he finds it hard to breathe.

“Eames.”

“Yes, Darling?”

“I don’t really think this is going to be our last night, but just in case...”

“Really, Arthur, is this the time?”

“There is only one time for this, and it’s this.” Arthur gestures at the room as if he could encompass everything had happened in the last week with one sweeping movement of his arm.

“With your ex in the next room?”

Arthur knits his brow. “Christ Eames, what do you think I’m going to say?”

Eames laughs. “I’ve already figured it out. Now go be with Ariadne, and let’s hope this night ends in our favor.”

Still holding his clothes, he moves over to Ariadne’s room and wonders if Eames knew what he wanted to say when even Arthur didn’t.

Ariadne is wearing one of Eames button-up shirts with a salmon triangle pattern and a pair of shorts, and is sitting cross-legged on a futon with her finger itching the trigger. Arthur takes a deep breath, and changes, trying to remember that she’s seen his body, and the only difference now was that they no longer sleep together.

Arthur still remembers the curves of her body, and he sometimes believes that Ariadne remembers the straight lines of his even after two years.

“I’m going to talk,” she whispers, breaking the silence between them. “Get my mind off of things a bit and keep me awake.”

Arthur dims the light in the room, and he doesn’t answer.

“Why does Eames think we had a bad breakup?” she asks.

“Eames is interested in drama. Everything else isn’t worth his time, so if he has to make it up, he’ll do it," murmurs Arthur.

“You never said to him, ‘We just didn’t fit’? Professionally, yes, but the other parts…”

It was like remembering the discussion all over again. They two of them sitting outside a Parisian café at a table that was lit with a candle that a breeze threatened to snuff out. There, they talked about how being in sync in the dream world didn’t mean anything in reality.  That if anything, their relationship was like that of a master and an apprentice.

The truth is, Arthur thinks his relationship with Ariadne didn’t work about because he was too old for her. Topside, he was only a few years older, but he started dreamshare a lot younger. He reckons his time spent under makes him somewhere around sixty-three years old. That's enough time to make a man need someone just as wise about the world, and while Araidne was born wise, it didn't make up for the years of experience he had.

Arthur sits down next to her. “What do you think Eames and I talk about?” Because really. Does she think he just blabs about his relationships to other people? Maybe she didn’t know him that well.

“Everything. He calls you ‘darling’, so I figure that means you’re pretty close.”

Arthur snorts, and shakes his head.

“What’s so funny?”

“It’s my last name.”

“What? Darling?”

“Yeah.”

Ariadne smiles shyly. “Arthur Darling? How did I never know that? Maybe that’s why we didn’t work out either. I didn't even know you're real name.”

“We work just fine. I teach you about dreamshare, and you build me brilliant mazes that take me weeks to memorize.”

“But I’ve got lot more to learn, don’t I?”

Arthur is about to say, “Not about architecture”, when a noise distracts him. The truth is, Ariadne has a lot more to learn about the business of dreamshare, but he’s pretty sure she’s picking up the knack of it ever since Cobb’s death has put her on the run. Ariadne see’s Arthur’s expression, and immediately goes quiet. She’s about to learn a whole lot more right now, Arthur thinks.

For an instant, Arthur considers the sound is just Eames rustling around in his room, but the moment he hears a grunt, he knows that the attack has begun. He’s about to go to Eames when he sees the window to their bedroom open out of the corner of his eye.

Arthur jumps to his feet, and Ariadne pulls out her gun and moves to a defensible position. Everything is flowing through his veins, from adrenaline to panic to resolve. He feels the children’s sleeping breaths beating in his heart, and the noises of Eames’ struggle pulsing down to his finger tips. In an instant, he grabs the man outside the window, and pulls him in using a judo grip. The two roll around on the ground, and he tries to slow time down in this mind. He feels the grip of a knife in the man’s hand, and the bulge of a holster on his thigh.

Arthur almost manages to roll him again, and get in position to break his neck when he remembers that they need him alive. In that instant, the indecision dooms him, and the man breaks free of his grip and counters with one of his own. Arthur tenses every muscle in his body as he struggles to keep his neck from snapping. He’s red-faced and it’s hard to breathe. He hears a gunshot, and the man topples on top of him.

“Damnnit, we need him alive,” he curses as fights to get himself out from under the limp body. The man is Asian, and Arthur is starting to see a flaw in their plan.

“I didn't shoot him. He is alive,” Ariadne says. Arthur looks over, and sees a great big red mark on back of the man’s head, and a bit of blood on the handle of Ariadne’s gun. He realizes now what the sound meant and he runs.

He rushes to Eames room, cognizant of the screams. He fears it’s Eames, and in the brief moment it takes for him to get to the door, he wonders if Eames really knew what he wanted to say earlier.

“Eames!” he shouts as he slides the door open with a slam.

Eames is on the ground, pointing his gun across the room. “Ay-up, cock,” Eames greets Arthur as if his lip isn’t split, or that the blood vessel in his eye isn’t burst. The woman who attacked him is holding onto her leg, but not moving because Eames has his gun pointed squarely between her eyes. Much like the man who attacked them, she is Asian, and Arthur presumes she’s Japanese.

Without ceremony, Arthur walks up to her and smacks the butt of his gun across her face. She falls to the _tatami_ , unconscious.

Slowly, Eames gets to his feet and regards Arthur. “I think you got the easier one,” he comments as he wobbles unsteadily, putting his hand against the wall to keep his balance.

Judging by the state of Eames’ face, Arthur feels like he can’t disagree. But they have other problems to attend to right now, chief amongst them is that Arthur thinks they are going to need Saitou and he wonders how well the powerful man will take a phone call at 2 o’clock in the morning.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Any one interested in beta-ing? :)


	10. Chapter 10

Eames’ PASIV is beat up, but it is still state-of-the-art because of all the upgrades. Every valve, wire, tubing and dial has been replaced at least once, and the metal casing shows the wear of traveling across oceans and continents. It’s unmistakably Eames’, and Arthur finds himself tracing his fingers across the dents while he sets up the dreamshare.

Arthur’s own Somancin kit is burnt to a crisp in LA, something which he regrets. It’s hard to imagine that the only thing left of his old life is an old science fiction book with a photograph pressed between its leaves, two traumatized children, and a fondness for someone else’s PASIV.

Everything is ready, and Arthur sits down in the corner and watches the two bodies, their chests rising subtly up and down. They have been bound with their wrists exposed, and they are gagged with a touch of chloroform on the rag to keep them under.

There is a knock at the door, and Arthur hears Eames answer it. There’s a soft murmur or discussion, the sound of the door closing, and the padding of footsteps towards the back room. When Arthur looks up, he sees Minami Utsunomiya, one of Saitou’s aids.

She doesn’t look like anything Arthur would have imagined, but he realizes that this is generally what you get with an urgent phone call in the middle of the night. It is only natural that she came wearing a pair of sweatpants, a baggy shirt with bad English, large glasses, no makeup, and her hair hastily tied up. She looks like a college student.

“Thank you for coming,” Arthur says.

“I get paid a lot of money to do what Saitou asks”, she replies, her accent British, maybe Midlands if Arthur had to guess.

Arthur nods.

“I, however, have never been asked to do this.” She eyes the scene warily, with two unconscious bodies hooked up to a strange metal device in the center of the room. On the left is the female attacker, her leg bandaged up. Arthur worries as the blood soaks through, even with the tourniquet, if she'll make it. It’s very likely she’ll die topside before they can get information from her in a dream.

“Do you know what dreamshare is?” Eames asks, standing behind her, his body leaning against the door. It’s deceptively casual, but Arthur knows he’s blocking her way.

“Saitou says it’s real, so I’ll believe him,” she replies evenly.

“Did he explain that these people are probably militarized?” presses Eames.

“What does that mean?”

“When we go in, they are probably going to try and kill us the instant they realize it’s a dream,” Arthur explains. “Don’t worry. It won’t actually kill you. It will just wake you up. Still, keep your head down. When we’re down there, we will fit you with a listening device.”

She nods, and Eames explains what else they need.

Ariadne is staring at the bodies, her eyes alert. Arthur knows this look. It’s the one she gets as she mentally prepares the maze. She starts to pull up her sleeve, and situate herself on the floor when something seems to catch her eye. “Arthur?”

“What?” He doesn’t look up from prepping the Somacin.

“Which one were we starting with?”

This is strange. Ariadne never asks questions she knew the answer to, and Arthur knows he told her. He turns his head to regard her, and cocks it. “The woman.”

“Well, she’s dead.”

“What?”

Arthur turns around, kneels down and puts his fingers to her throat. There is no pulse. “Damnnit.”

Asian women were more likely to speak English. There is an even greater chance now that they’ll have to completely rely on the translator Saitou sent, and it makes Arthur a little sick to his stomach.

Truth is, no one going down will be an extractor, and Arthur had never pulled a job without one. Dom made the rare leap from architecture to extraction, but he had no choice. Eames is an extractor who could forge, but he was staying topside. Arthur? Arthur is a point man. His job is to plan everything, and when it goes to shit, improvise, and he figures that’s almost everything an extractor has to do anyway.

But he isn’t going to extract. Minami is. She’s that one variable he can’t account for at all, and it's terrifying. Maybe, when he survives all of this, people will talk about how crazy Arthur went under without an extractor and got the information he needed. Maybe, but it seemed unlikely.

They ready themselves, Arthur placing the IV into Minami’s veins after Ariadne. He goes to do his own, and Eames grabs his wrist, and deftly takes the needle from him.

He doesn’t say anything, but Arthur can tell by the way he’s looking at him that there is something he wants to say. Arthur swallows, and nods. He allows himself to pushed down to the floor by Eames, and Eames places the needle in his veins. He gives Arthur one final look before he presses the button and Arthur is in Narita Airport.

Ariadne is a genius. She had only unveiled her idea an hour or so ago, but Arthur is still impressed.

Neither Ariadne or Arthur would look out of place as foreigners, and it was certain that assassins sent to kill Arthur and Eames would have done their fair share of airports. Add in how much Narita was already a maze, the luggage lockers, and Arthur feels this would be a fairly easy job, even with the untrained civilian as their extractor. But he can't let himself get to cocky. These are still less than acceptable conditions for a dream job like this.

The three of them start in the smoking area, a short brown box that sticks out from the wall. It's crowded, and difficult to see and breath in. Arthur automatically grabs into his pocket for box. He isn’t surprised that he has already dreamt them up. He usualy does. Next to him, Ariadne is wrinkling her nose, and Arthur hands her a cigarette just in case the assassin is militarized. Anything could tip them off, even something as small as someone not smoking in a smoking area. Or, you know, taking a mark at gunpoint in the rain, but that was a different job and a different time. Inception got them into this mess, and he doesn't need to dwell on it anymore than he already has.

Ariadne understands as she takes a cigarette, but she makes it evident she doesn’t like it.

 “Relax. Smoking won’t kill you in a dream,” says Arthur.

“I could get cancer psychosomatically,” she retorts flatly.

“How did we get here?” asks Minami, as she cautiously takes a proffered cigarette.

“It’s just as we explained topside. We’re in the apartment still, sleeping away. Only now, we’re tapped into his dreams. Let’s review real quick. What are you doing?” 

“I just go up to the man and tell him where the information drop off point is.”

“Which is?”

“Locker 42 on the fourth floor of the north wing.”

“Good.” Arthur nods, and inhales another long breath of smoke. The three leave the smoking area and head over to the departure gate, where the mark is deplaning. Ariadne doesn’t fill in this part of the airport with as much detail, and Arthur glances to see what the assailant’s mind had put in as for it's departure point. 

Seoul, it says. He narrows his eyes. That’s not Cobol territory.

“I can’t die, right?” Minami asks, eyeing their mark.

“Yup.”

Minami takes a deep breath, and walks over to him. Arthur and Ariadne walk over to a group of chair out of the assassin’s line of vision, and he taps his ear. The listening device Ariadne dreamt up works like a charm.

Only, his Japanese isn’t really all that good to understand what’s being said. He hears something about the information ( _jyouhou)_  and a locker ( _rokkaa_ ), so he figures she knows what’s she’s doing. The man nods, and gets up. Then he hears the numbers 1-0-6-6 and he knows Minami has nailed it.

Arthur stands up. “Let’s go.”

Ariadne, like the goddess of labyrinths she is named for, designed a flawless maze. It would take their mark at least twenty minutes to get to the locker, but only a few moments for Ariadne and Arthur. Ariande put in a short cut in the maze, an escalator that she hid in the girls bathroom. It defies physics and takes them to their destination in less than a minute.  They find the locker and open it up. Arthur takes out the information, and slips it underneath his arm. He doesn’t want to be caught by the locker reading the documents just in case the assassin was faster than they thought he would be.

He and Ariandne make it to a small coffee shop, and they start pouring over the documents when Arthur’s concentration is broken by Ariadne cursing.

"Shit."

“What?” He looks up, but he doesn’t need an answer. There, at the locker, is Dom Cobb. Worse yet, he is tapping the assassin on the shoulder, and pointing him in Arthur and Ariadne’s direction.

“Did you bring him in here?” she asks.

“Why would I? Was it you?”

“I don’t know.”

And Arthur realizes his answer to her question is the same.

In less than five seconds, the projections of the travelers at the airport tear them apart, and they all awake in the stale air of the Tokyo apartment. Arthur looks over at Eames, who has his hand placed firmly on the assassin’s shoulders. Eames meets his eye, and Arthur nods.

Eames nods back, and puts his hands around the man’s throat. He chokes him until the gurgling noises stop.


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Many thank to my beta, [MariaCaterina](http://archiveofourown.org/users/MariaCaterina/pseuds/MariaCaterina). :) She is much needed, and much appreciated.

They are silent as they leave the apartment. The still-sleeping James is cradled in Arthur’s arms and Phillipa is draped over Eames’ shoulder. Ariadne wheels her suitcase out, and they leave in a dark car with black windows. They switch cars in tunnels and in parking garages before they settle on a taxi that drives them to a _shikansen_ station, where they take the next train to Kyoto.

It reminds Arthur of what got them into the mess. He sees Saitou sitting across from him, unaware that his water is drugged. He sees Nash next to him, and ﬁghts the urge not to punch the chair.

“Uncle Arthur?”

Phillipa is awake, and staring at him. She’s a yo-yo: not speaking to Arthur one moment, and the next, she locks her eyes with his. It scares him.

“Where are we?” she asks.

“We’re on a train.”

“Why?”

“We had to leave.”

Phillipa scowls. “Can we go home now?”

Arthur wishes Cobb was here. Cobb would know how to answer these sorts of questions. Arthur? Arthur only knows honesty. “We can never go home, Phil. We’re going to have to make a new one.”

“Not with you.”

“We’ll have to see,” Arthur sighs. He really doesn’t know how to deal with this. “Just look out for your little brother, okay? He’s younger and not as smart as you.”

The words catch Phillipa off-guard and she nods even as her eyes shine with distrust.

“Want something to eat?” He changes the subject, eyeing the snack cart that’s coming closer. “You like chocolate?”

Phillipa doesn’t answer, so he buys a few sandwiches, some bottles of CC Lemon, and a box of Takenoko no Satos, thinking the kids will like the chocolate. It's not a healthy meal by any standards, but Arthur wants to pay in cash, and it’s all the money he feels he can afford.

Eames and Ariadne take the sandwiches gratefully, and Phillipa stares at hers. It’s another hour before she takes it and opens it.

“It’s got corn in it,” she pronounces, and sets the sandwich down.

“That it does, pet,” says Eames. “The world can be a strange mysterious place, can’t it?

Arthur doesn't know how, but something in what Eames says does the trick. She eats half, and gives the other half to James who is only just now groggily coming too.

The ﬁve of them ride in silence, and Ariadne keeps giving him meaningful looks, none of which he can really understand. He thinks they all say “You’ve become Dom Cobb," and “You've put us in danger”.

He tries to give her equally meaningful looks that mean “We don’t know who brought Cobb in yet”.

Finally, he gives up trying to have a half-conversation with Ariadne. He stands up.

“Eames, a word.”

Eames seems surprised but he follows Arthur anyway, and Ariadne moves over to Arthur’s seat to steal a chocolate.

Arthur and Eames move into the section between the cars, where the whirring noise of the train against the tracks makes it difﬁcult to be heard, let alone be overheard.

“Something wrong, Darling?”

Arthur doesn’t know how to say it. There is no preamble. So, he just says, “Cobb was there.”

Eames raises his eyebrows, and his hand dips into his pocket and he pulls out a ﬁve hundred yen coin. He rolls it in his ﬁngers. “That why Saitou’s aide was crying about being torn apart? Dom set the projections off?”

“Yeah. But I don’t know who brought him in. It could have been me. It could have been Ariadne.”

Eames rubs his thumb on the coin, and leans his head back. “We both know who brought him in.”

“I’m going to need you to take me down, anyway, even if it’s just a few layers, and see.”

“Fine. The moment we get to Kyoto, we’ll do that. Have you bought our tickets?”

“Yeah. I couldn’t get anything until 1700 hours. We’ll have ﬁve minutes to spend at a karaoke box or something. That is, if the kids don’t try and kill us ﬁrst.”

“I don’t suppose keeping them drugged is a good idea?”

Despite himself, Arthur snorts. “We’ll buy them some handheld games. And yeah, we’ll sneak in some more tranquilizers. It’ll keep them until Seoul.”

“We are the world’s worst babysitters.”

 

* * *

 

 

The landscape Arthur ﬁnds himself in is pressed between the pages of a cheesy science ﬁction novel, and it’s almost effortless how he ﬁlls it. He is looking over the streets of Istanbul from the roof of a mid-rise apartment. He knows that it’s him ﬁlling the air with the evening prayer, voices from two temples overlapping and echoing around each other. The taste in his mouth is ash and smoke, and a sweet smell of bread wafts in through the fog. That, he also added.

Eames is there, sitting on an old bench with peeling red paint, his legs open, and his ﬁngers ﬁddling with a poker chip.

“Sorry, Darling, but that’s not me.”

Arthur turns, and isn’t surprised to ﬁnd another Eames, the real Eames, standing there, an amused expression on his face. When he turns around, the only thing that remains of his projection is a long wisp of smoke that lazily dissipates into the air.

“Your hair is black again,” Eames comments. There isn’t a mirror around, but Arthur believes Eames. He would never dream himself up with his bleached hair. It isn’t him. Arthur thinks that even if he makes it to eighty, he’d still dream himself up as he is now.

“Of course it is. You've been going through my stuff?” Arthur asks.

“Not on purpose. The book and the photo fell out of your bag a few nights ago and I was curious. It wasn’t hard to build. I remember the scenery fairly well.”

Arthur turns around, and hangs his arms over the railing of the balcony. “The Istanbul job,” Arthur says.

“I’ve had a lot of Istanbul jobs,” remarks Eames, standing next to Arthur to look at the panorama.

“But this was the one you’ll always remember.”

“Mmm.” Eames nods his head. He pulls out pack of cigarettes from beneath his jacket, takes out a stick and hands it to Arthur. Arthur quit ages ago, but he grasps it and Eames takes another for himself. “And the book… Arthur, I’m starting to feel a little stalked.”

Arthur doesn’t answer at ﬁrst. He pulls a drag of smoke, and lets it drift across the rooftops. “You’re the one who knows my last name.”

“Oi, that’s professionalism. Had to know who you were before I could work with you.”

“Well, I just happened to be at a used book store. I picked it up on a whim.”

“And it’s the only thing you saved before you burned your house down. More than anything in the world, you wanted a copy of a book that we a found in a hotel room and made fun of, and a photo of Istanbul. Arthur, you should really come out and say it.”

“Say what?” Arthur raises his eyebrows as he turns to look at Eames.

Eames won’t look him in the eye, and he keeps his gaze focused on the distance. “It’s like there are two realities when we speak. There's the one that is, and then there's a whole other conversation that neither of us has really worked out.”

“Perhaps it should occur to you that the reason why neither of us says anything is because neither of us has worked out what we feel or want.” Or maybe, that’s just Arthur.

Eames inhales again, and he let’s the smoke out slowly. He pulls the cigarette out of his mouth, and extinguishes it on the railing, leaving a black smudge, and he takes out another one.

“No sign of Cobb yet,” Eames says out of the corner of his mouth as he attempts ignite a ﬂame on his lighter. He ﬁnally manages it, and takes a long drag. Eames,

Arthur reminds himself, had also quit in reality.

And it’s with that thought that Arthur ﬁnally understands Eames. In reality, Eames is a non-smoker. But the real reality, in this dream, is that he wants to smoke. He loves it. Arthur is the same.

“There are two realities with you Eames,” Arthur says. “There's the one where you're you, and I know I can’t trust you as far as I can throw you--"

“You’ve got big biceps, love. You could probably manage some distance.”

Arthur rolls his eyes. “And then there’s the fact that I do trust you. Always. In all situations, even when I know I can’t trust anyone, I call up Chuck Wagner and you’re here. In one reality, I think you’re setting me up, but in another, I don’t. I’m carefully walking through two worlds that almost look the same, but have different reactions. Does that make sense? ”

Eames laughs. “No.”

“Look, I wasn’t planning on a heartfelt talk right now. You’ll forgive me if I’m not coming up with the right words.”

“Let’s try this, shall we? Let me say what I think you’re saying, and you can agree, or disagree.”

Arthur nods, and rubs the stub his cigarette on the railing leaving a matching black smudge of ash.

“You like me and I’m fairly certain you want to fuck me, but you can’t trust me because this is dreamshare and that’s always been a bad idea.”

“Crassly put…”

“I’m really done tip-toeing Arthur. Yeah, I don't know what I want. I want to fuck you, naturally, but I’d like to be a lot more…” Eames cringes slightly, “...romantic, or what not. I don’t live my life from each of your phone calls to the next, but I ﬁnd myself wanting to. That’s why I go to Mombasa, because bloody hell, Arthur, you are harder to read than a Magic Eye of Shakespeare. Every time I thought I got it right in the past, you notice and you throw doubt in because... Well, bugger it. I don’t know why.”

The emotions are too complicated to explain, and Arthur sits with them in his mouth trying to ﬁgure out how to expel them.

“It’s because one of you is going to run.” A third voice enters the conversation. “He doesn’t know if it will be you or him, but one of you will run.”

Arthur jerks his head to see Dom Cobb, wearing the same outﬁt he had been wearing the last time he was in Istanbul. Linen pants and jacket with green undershirt.

Eames says nothing.

Arthur just says, “Well fuck.”

“Hello, Arthur,” greets Cobb.

“Why the hell are you here?”

“They’re not your kids.” Cobb raises a gun, and Arthur doesn’t bother to dodge.

He opens his eyes in the bright lights of the karaoke box. Ariadne is ﬂipping through a fashion magazine she doesn’t seem interested in while the TV ﬂashes possible selections. The kids are in the corner playing their new Nintendo DS.

“Well, this is going to be a problem,” Eames says once he opens his eyes.

“Which part?” Arthur drags his hands across his face as he slowly rises to a sitting position.

Eames doesn’t answer, and Ariadne frowns at the exchange.

 


	12. Chapter 12

The flight to Korea is uncomfortable. Arthur senses Eames' presence in the seat behind him painfully, feeling every bullet Cobb put between his eyes all at once. He wants to talk to him, to explain Cobb... or may be deny him. He doesn’t know. All he knows is that it’s not a conversation to be had a plane, so he sits and tries to keep his mind from listing from one dream of Cobb to another.

How could he, of all people, have a specter? No one knew more than him the dangers of manifesting guilt. Mal had shot him too many times for him not to.

But what guilt could he have? It isn’t like he wanted Cobb to die. He tried to save the man for god’s sake. No. This isn’t guilt. This is something else.

If anything, the kids are the only specters he needs from Cobb's life. And they're worse. At least Mal only came to haunt him in Cobb's dreams. James and Phillipa haunt him when he's awake and asleep. He does not want them here. He does not want to care for them. He only wants to go out and murder every lead he finds until he gets to the top. Once he found that person, he would linger three layers down in that their dream and torture them for as many months satisfied him.

 _Thump_.

Arthur sighs, and looks over at James. Even drugged, the kids are sick of traveling, and they let Arthur know it. _Thump_. James kicks the back of the seat in front of him again, and Phillipa squirms. Arthur is no father-- a bullet between his eyes in his dreams confirmed that—so he sits there helpless while he tries to catch James’ feet before they kick out again.

He gets a tap on his shoulder, and Ariandne leans in from the seat behind him. “Switch seats with Eames.” When it looks like Arthur isn’t doing it fast enough, or questioning why, she commands, “Now.”

As they change, Arthur feels keenly aware of Eames body heat has he brushes past, not a quarter of an inch of space between them in the narrow aisleway. He imagines he can still smell smoke and menthol on Eames’ breath.

Eames doesn’t even look at him as he sits down, and puts a steadying hand on James’ legs.

Finally, he seats himself in Eames’ place, feeling his residual heat. Bizarrely, it makes him think of cigarettes.

“How much have you told them?” Ariandne murmurs, her eyes on the back James and Phillipa’s seats.

At first, Arthur doesn’t know who she’s talking about until he follows her eyes. “Who? The kids?"

Ariadne nodes.

Arthur rolls his eyes. "What am I supposed to tell them? They’re just kids.”

“No they’re not.” Ariandne shakes her head. “Not anymore.”

“What’s your point?”

“They’re Cobb’s kids. They’re smart. If you give them information, maybe they won’t be so afraid of you.”

Arthur goes silent for a moment, and glances to his right at the window seat. In it, a Japanese man sleeps with his head resting against the shade, his mouth hanging open. A trickle of drool collects at the corner of his lips. “They’ll hate him. Cobb, I mean.” And for the first time in a week and half, he realizes that is the truth. He doesn’t want Cobb’s children to hate their own father. More than that, he doesn’t want Phillipa to call him a liar when she doesn’t believe him.

“So?” Ariadne scowls, but keeps her gaze low. She refuses to look at Arthur as she spits, “He’s dead, Arthur.”

Saitou’s words about Ariadne’s compassion play in Arthur’s mind, and he realizes just how badly the businessman had underestimated her. Compassion she had, but never in the face of rationality. It is that trait that probably attracted him to her in the first place.

When Arthur doesn’t answer, Ariadne continues. “Look, I’m not suggesting inception, but I think we need to take them down a level or so.”

Arthur snorts. “Are you crazy? It’s unstable for kids.”

“Arthur, I’m not a rookie anymore. I know you can do it. I know you have done it. We take them down, Eames can forge Cobb, and as Cobb he can tell them what happened. And we do that as many times as it takes because they are a huge liability until they start to trust you.”

Arthur has all sorts of objections, but none of them really make sense in the face of Ariadne’s cold logic.

“It can’t be me,” he finally says.

“Why not?”

“Because I’m the one that brought Cobb in. If that Cobb shows up in the dreamscape, we may never be able to put the kids back together again.”

Ariadne’s eyes are calculating as she looks at Arthur. “Is it like Mal?”

Arthur shakes his head, because he still remembers Mal as she was, not the malicious specter that Ariadne knew. No, Mal was a friend with sarcastic wit and fierce loyalty, and it was that loyalty that would be her undoing in the end; so fierce that she would take her own life to try and protect Cobb.

At least, that is what Arthur thinks may have happened. Cobb never told him why Mal was in his dreams, sabotaging everything in a vain attempt to wake him up. Cobb thought he was so damned good at keeping secrets, but Arthur knew there were two truths, neither he could trust more than the other. Either Cobb had killed Mal, or Mal had killed herself.

Whichever it was, Cobb couldn’t live with the guilt, and Arthur paid the price with every botched, or nearly botched, extraction after that.

Arthur is still paying the price.

“Arthur,” Ariadne says, pulling him out of his thoughts. “Is it like Mal?”

“I think so,” he says, even though he knows it’s not. This is something else… and it scares him.

“Shit.” She closes her eyes, and rests her head on the back of her seat.

Arthur can only nod.

 

***

 

Their hotel is in Incheon, which is about as close to Seoul as Arthur feels prepared to handle. It’s cleaner than Seoul, for the most part, and it's alleyways don't seem as dark and twisting. During the course of the flight, winter had come, and the ground was frosted and slippery as they got out of their taxi. Sometimes Arthur forgets how much further north Korea is from Japan.

He feels edgy as he enters the lobby, with Eames flanking their small party casually, but still expertly. He knows this is Saitou’s territory, so they should be relatively safe, but if their assailants came from here, or were going here, Saitou’s power didn’t mean anything anymore.

Cobol is infinitely ballsier than Arthur thought they were. It used to be all you had to do was get on plane and make it to Saitou, or Fisher territory, and you were safe. But then again, Cobol paid Arthur and Cobb to take Saitou’s thoughts on the bullet train. Cobol has been infiltrating other territories for a long time, and he hadn't realized it. He wondered if there was anywhere safe from their connections now.

Arthur never takes a job without an escape plan worked out. You are a fool not to in dreamshare. He doesn’t have one now, and he finds relying on his wits to be more and more exhausting. Perhaps that is why Arthur feels on edge. Not because he is on the run from shady corporations, but because this is the first time he doesn’t have some semblance of a plan first. Yes, he is an improviser. But, only when his meticulously crafted plans go south, and that doesn’t happen all that often. It is why people hired him. It is why Cobb couldn’t let him go.

But why couldn’t he let Cobb go?

Arthur shook his head, and takes the keys from the hotelier. The small, bald man behind the counter is disapproving that all five of them are trying to crowd into one room, but Arthur ignores his upturned nose.

The five move down the hallway like pack train climbing the highest mountain in the world. They stumble into their suitcases as Arthur moves to the front to unlock the door, and they file in.

James lays himself out on the heated floors of the room almost immediately, and Arthur slides him out of the way with his foot so Ariadne can get her suitcase through the door. Eames pauses at the threshold, and looks left and right before retreating into the room.

The clicks of the lock register in Arthur’s mind as he goes through his luggage to find new outfits for Phillipa and James. Everything is wrinkled from the many times he haphazardly threw the clothes in, and he frowns at them.

Arthur feels Ariadne’s eyes on him, and he knows what she’s pushing him to do. She sits on the edge of the bed, her elbows on her knees and her hands folded in front of her mouth as she looks up at his face.

Eames is at the other side of the room, pushing at the frame around the window, and checking the lock.

Arthur hands Ariadne two sets of new clothes. “Stay with them a sec, and get them dressed, will you, Ariadne?”

Ariadne narrows her eyes as she takes the garments, but she nods in agreement.

“Eames, can we talk a minute?” Arthur asks, heading toward the door.

Eames walks to his suitcase, and bends over to pull out a clean shirt. “Sure, one second.” He takes off his stained sweater, and Arthur finds himself staring at the play of muscles that he’s seen so many times before, and the small hint of belly fat that he finds comforting. Eames breathes deeply as he shifts the black t-shirt to sit smoothly across his broad shoulders, and then follows Arthur out into the hallway.

“What is it?” he asks. His voice is low, like it is when he wakes up from dreamsharing. Arthur thinks this is probably how he sounds in the morning, and small jolt of electricity tingles through his nerves at the thought.

Arthur goes to the other side of the hall, and leans against the wall. “Ariadne says we should put the kids under.”

Eames snorts. “Haven’t we been doing that?”

“With Somacin…” Arthur lets the sentence hang there, not really sure how to finish it, hoping that Eames will complete the thought Ariadne started.

Eames bites his lip, and leans back against the wall opposite of Arthur. “To what end?”

“She thinks if you forge Cobb, and talk to them…” Again, Arthur doesn’t know how to complete this thought either.

Eames crosses his arms, and glowers at Arthur. “I don’t bloody know any more than you do about kids and trauma. Wouldn’t their dead dad suddenly being alive fuck them up more?”

“What else can we do? How do we get Cobol when they're one temper tantrum away from blowing our cover.”

Eames goes silent, his eyes on the carpet as if deep in thought. Arthur waits, concentrating on keeping himself from fidgeting nervously. Abruptly, Eames launches himself from the wall, and steps in close to Arthur.

“Arthur.” His voice is low, and growling, and it makes Arthur’s stomach stir. “Why can’t you hide?”

“What?” Arthur can almost see his shaky exhalation kiss Eames’ neck before it dissipates into the hallway.

“I know it goes against who you are. Sometimes you retreat, but you always come back with guns blazing. You took the Cobol job when you should have been laying low.”

“That was Cobb,” Arthur says flatly.

A corner of Eames’ mouth quirks upward. “Does Cobb make decisions for you, then?”

Arthur closes his eyes, and steadies himself. He squares his shoulders, and looks straight at Eames. “What’s your point?”

“I’m saying, Arthur, that this inability to stay hidden will be the death of you and those kids. “

Arthur takes a deep breath to retort, but Eames put up a hand. “Let me finish. I’m not saying that we aren’t going to burn Cobol to the ground. I'm saying we aren’t going to do it now. Besides, I’ve been working on paperwork.”

“Paperwork for what?”

“To hide.”

Arthur frowns. “Why didn’t you mention this plan before?”

“Because we were still on the run, and I didn’t know that going to Korea was an idea you got from our assassin’s dream until we got on the plane.”

Arthur finds he can’t look Eames in the eye, and he lets his gaze drift to the hardwood floor. “If we don’t follow that lead, we may never find it again, Eames,” he grumbles.

“If we don’t hide, we’ll be dead, Arthur.” Eames’ tone is placating, like he’s soothing an upset toddler.

They are so close, their musky, frustrated breathes mingling in the small amount of air that lies between them. And Arthur is just tired, so he leans his head on Eames’ shoulder and just gives in. “Where do we go?”

“One of my identity’s has a lovely house in Londonderry.”

“I’ve never heard of that one.”

“Which is why we know Cobol doesn’t know about it. If you couldn’t find it, they certainly won’t be able to.”

“I don’t think Europe will be that safe. More things to track you there, like CCTV and shoppers cards.”

“I think that impeccable identity forgeries in Europe will protect us far more than going to a backwater place where we can be recognized as ‘the foreigners’. Besides, anyone can forge a Thai passport. But a British one? Well, that takes a great deal more skill. They will not expect us there.”

“But our accents…”

“Simple. You married a charming Brit from the midlands who got job in Northern Ireland.”

Arthur's eyes go wide in realization. “You didn’t...”

Eames moves in closer, and snakes his arms around Arthur’s back as he murmurs into Arthur’s ear. “Just think of it as a very awkward, and long first date.”

Arthur ignores the warm feeling, willing himself to concentrate on Eames' plan rather than overload of sensations that is washing over him.“What about Ariadne?” He is surprised that his mouth is suddenly dry, and his voice comes out hoarse.

“Your sister.”

“You could have married Ariadne instead, and made us a little less conspicuous.”

“I’m trying not to give you mixed signals here, Darling.”

Despite himself, Arthur smiles into Eames shoulder. “That’s a lot of commitment to ask for a first date.”

“With you, it seems even asking for a date is too much commitment.”

Arthur sighs. It is true. He’ll never admit it to Ariadne, but he dated her because he knew it wasn’t going anywhere. It was fun, and comfortable, and he still loves her. The relationship was perfect because he knew he could walk away. “What is James and Phillipa’s cover? Are they my kids?”

“Yes.”

Arthur remembers Dom’s bloody smile, the bullet between his eyes, and he winces into Eames’ shoulder. “I won’t be sleeping well for some time, then.”

“What do you mean?”

Arthur takes a deep breath, and pushes away. “I’ll tell you another day. Let’s just do this, before I change my mind and track down that lead.”

Respectfully taking a step back, Eames shifts aside as Arthur swipes his keycard and opens the door to their room. He’s immediately met with a shoe that whizzes past his face.

“What the hell?” Adrenaline pumps through his veins as he ducks to the side, and jerks his head around, looking for an assailant.

He finds her in the middle of the room. Red-haired, and glowering, Phillipa holds a second shoe in her hand. “Take us home.”

“We can’t go home,” Arthur says, trying to calm his beating heart as he wipes a hand across his face. “It’s not safe.”

“We’ll never be safe as long as you’re here!” Before Phillipa can throw her other shoe, Ariadne holds her wrist.

“We can’t trust dad’s friends!” Phillipa screams. “The people who came in to kill dad said they were friends. You all said you’re dad’s friends, and took us away.”

“Shhhh,” Arthur commands, moving into the room fast with Eames shutting the door right behind him.

But Phillipa doesn’t quiet. She claws her hands as she begins to flail in Ariadne’s grip. Eames pushes Arthur aside and grabs her while she yells and screams, grimacing every time a foot lands into his stomach. He is unyielding while he holds her. On the ground, James begins to cry. He points under the bed, and shivers against the wall.

Arthur heart constricts as he walks passed Eames and Phillipa, and lifts up the dust ruffle. For a moment, he thinks hitmen could have been hiding there. He knows it isn’t real, but he can see James cowering beneath the matress.

“We have to do something,” Ariadne says as she moves over to her large suitcase and begins pulling out clothing.

“Well, what do you expect?” asks Eames, holding Phillipa as she sobs limply in his arms. “It’s been barely a week and they’ve been drugged for nearly all of it so they haven’t had time to cope. Yet, we keep taking them to strange places. They need a therapist.”

“We don’t have that luxury, Eames.” Arthur’s voice is low, and heavy with a decision he doesn’t want to make.

Ariandne pulls out the PASIV from under a dirty hoodie, and puts it on the bed.“Then dream it is,” says Ariadne, crossing her arms to look at Eames.

Eames’ expression is unreadable as he sets the crying Phillipa down the bed. She stops struggling, and curls up with her back toward Arthur as she weeps.

Arthur goes over to James and sits down next to him. "Nothing's there," he whispers, and James buries his face into Arthur's side. Arthur lifts his arms and holds the boy. He presses his face against James' short hair, and he doesn't look up when Ariadne whispers, "This is going to sting a little, but I promise you, it will help you feel better."

He doesn't look when Ariande and Eames arrange themselves on the floor and hook themselves up to the PASIV. Instead, he concentrates on the small boy in his arms, and hopes that at least he can do this part right. He doesn't want to fall asleep tonight after this. He doesn't want to know what Cobb will say.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have no idea why it took me so long to update this other than I had a very bad year, and then it slipped off my radar.
> 
> So... sorry! I really do want to keep updating this :)


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